Sunday 12 January 2014

Speed productivity with voice commands

After seeing Siri on the iphone in action, I was absolutely sure Google had some form of virtual assistance up their sleeve.  After some experimenting and learning these voice commands I have grown to like these time saving features.

Voice commands


To initiate a voice command you need to to click the "Microphone" icon on the right side of the Google search bar.

This can be found on Android by holding the "Home" button and then dragging your thumb out of the "Google" circle(Google Now app).  On the desktop Chrome web browser the icon is visible also in the Google search bar.

Some Android versions won't have Google Now, so you need to manually install this via Google App store.

Voice commands not documented 

I discovered from other helpful commands that was not documented.  a couple of commands I saw demostrated on Siri and couldn't help but try it out on the Android.

"Set timer"
Voice example:
    "Set timer 10 minutes"

Definition
Voice example:
    "Define cat"

Facts
Voice example:
    "Population London"

Calculation
Voice example:
    "56.3 * 5.8"

Translation
Voice example:
    "How are you today in german"
    (NOTE: Translation is still rough but close)

Weather
Voice example:
    "What is the weather today"
    "Will it rain tomorrow"

Traffic
Voice example:
    "Traffic London"


Tips

Some commands work on the Desktop web browser Chrome, just click the microphone icon.

When using the phone, hold the phone mic close to your mouth to help filter out background noise, thus getting a more accurate response.

If a command is not picked up well, think of the words in parts and speak clearly.  Otherwise it will just search the web with what it thinks.